Welcome to "The #1 Dodge Ram Forum!"

68,000 Ram Truck Owners and Growing!

We are a tight knit community of like minded enthusiasts who value "on topic", clean discussion. If this sounds like something you'd like to participate in, register and become a Dodge Ram Owners Club Member Today!

You are currently viewing our boards as a guest which gives you limited access to view most discussions and access our other features. By joining our community you will have access to post topics, create your own image gallery to share with everyone, communicate privately with other members (PM), respond to polls, upload content and access many other special features. Registration is fast, simple and absolutely free! So please, join our community today!

If you have any problems with the registration process or your account login, please contact us.

For a while I've been thinking about putting a double DIN deck in my truck (to replace my single DIN Pioneer). This weekend I decided to stop my my local audio shop and ended up coming out with a brand new deck. Definitely spent a little more than I wanted to but I figured if I'm gonna do it, I gotta do it right. So I got the Kenwood DNX690HD which has all the bells and whistles I will ever want/need. The amount of stuff this deck can do is actually ridiculous. I'm a very tech savvy guy and I can see it taking me a while to learn everything about this deck.

Unfortunately I didn't get any pics of the install. I was in a bit of a rush as I had somewhere to be later in the afternoon. The wiring is pretty straight forward, just connected the new Kenwood harness to my existing harness adaptor that I had for the Pioneer. Ran the new mic to a nice spot right near my cluster and ran the GPS antenna onto the dash right beside the photo sensor for the automatic lights. I did have to cut the top of the metal bracket inside the dash as well as the plastic between the two holes that the install kit actually screws in to. It's definitely a snug fit.

So far I'm very happy with the deck. There's a few things that aren't quite working the way they should be yet but I'll figure them out pretty quick. Just haven't had a chance to read the 136 page instruction book yet. I'm very happy with the Garmin NAV too, it's definitely a big step up over the $88 TomTom that I had before.

As always, I'll continue to post more reviews as I use the deck more and if you have any questions about the install or deck feel free to ask. I'll try to answer the best I can.

My truck doesn't have the steering wheel buttons but you can get the wiring harness to make them work and I did notice that there is a steering wheel control wire on the decks harness. So I'm going to say they would. The deck will work with OEM reverse cameras and parking sensors as well. It's actually crazy how much it does. I'd look it up on Kenwoods website if you're interested in finding out more.

Looks great. Is the new deck a double din? Did you have to do any mods to the bezel?

Yes it is a full double din. I didn't do any mods to the bezel itself. Only to things behind it. I did cut the top off the metal bracket that supported the stock head unit and I had to cut some of the plastic in front of that in order to get the deck to slide in. I pretty much split it between the bolt holes that hold it in.

I have to take the deck out in a couple weeks to replace it with a new one (long story, but the bluetooth isn't working correctly so they're getting me a new one) and to install a backup camera. When I do that I'll take a few more pics of what I did to make it fit.

I figured since I have a full double din deck that's capable of having a back up camera hooked up to it I might as well add one. It will definitely make life easier backing into parking spots where the car behind me is too narrow to see in the mirrors or hooking up to trailers.

The unit I bought is the Audiovox Cmos2 5-In-1 Multi-Mount Back-Up Camera. Yes there were cheaper ones available on Amazon but I liked this one because of how small it is and how much it looks like the OEM one. Found it through another members thread on the forum, his install looked good and easy so that's what sold me in this camera. I also bought a 25ft RCA video cable with my purchase. Paid $69.54 for the two... can't really go wrong with that. Here's the link:

Installing the camera itself was fairly simple. I removed the access panel on the tailgate and then removed the two bolts holding the tailgate handle on. From there I used a hole saw to cut out the hole (the handle had a ridge where the OEM camera would be located). I cleaned up the hole with an exacto knife and file to ensure that the camera would sit nice and flush. From there I installed the camera into the handle and then reinstalled the handle into the truck. I covered all the wiring from the handle to underneath the cab in lum for protection against sharp edges or rubbing.

I hooked up the power for the camera to the reverse wire on the 7 pin trailer plug (it's the middle wire, white with a red tracer I believe), and the ground to one of the bumper bolts. I hooked it up with a two prong connector to be able to easily disconnect it all if I need to remove the tailgate. From there I ran the RCA cable up along the drivers side frame of the truck along the main wiring harness and then up through the grommet in the firewall right beside the power wire for my amp. Obviously from there it went straight to my deck.

Went into the backup camera settings on the deck and turned on reverse interruption and BAM! It worked. Obviously it was crooked at first.... I ended up taking a 2x8 that I had laying on the side of the house and layed it on the ground 6 ft back from each tire. Then I just played around spinning the camera until it was happy with how straight it was.

Overall the install time probably took be about 2.5 hours. The worst part was running the wire all the way up the frame of the truck and making sure it was tied up nice and neatly, and then getting it through the firewall grommet. But for $70 I'm definitely happy with this mod!!